Studies on the Software Testing Profession

TL;DR

This study explores the motivators and de-motivators influencing software testing careers across four countries, highlighting the importance of human factors and perceptions in shaping testers' career decisions.

Contribution

It provides cross-cultural insights into software testers' perceptions and motivations, emphasizing the need for research on individual assessments of testing activities.

Findings

Testing careers are influenced by human-dependent tasks and environmental factors.

Perceptions of testing activities vary across different countries.

Understanding motivators can help industry improve tester retention and satisfaction.

Abstract

This paper attempts to understand motivators and de-motivators that influence the decisions of software professionals to take up and sustain software testing careers across four different countries, i.e. Canada, China, Cuba, and India. The research question can be framed as "How many software professionals across different geographies are keen to take up testing careers, and what are the reasons for their choices?" Towards that, we developed a cross-sectional but simple survey-based instrument. In this study we investigated how software testers perceived and valued what they do and their environmental settings. The study pointed out the importance of visualizing software testing activities as a set of human-dependent tasks and emphasized the need for research that examines critically individual assessments of software testers about software testing activities. This investigation can help global industry leaders to understand the impact of work-related factors on the motivation of testing professionals, as well as inform and support management and leadership in this context.